Heat exchangers such as oil coolers built from pan-shaped plates are known from, for example, EP 0 828 980 B1. In such heat exchangers, the plates have bent edges and individual plates are stacked on top of one another with their edges overlapping. The media such as oil to be cooled and coolant are distributed in the heat exchanger through tubes, with the plates defining alternating channels for the two different fluids. The entire oil cooler is often screwed on a housing (e.g., on the housing of a filter using a mounting plate), with a distributor plate integrated between the oil cooler and the mounting plate. Bores are sometimes provided in the distributor plate to distribute both fluids (the coolant and the oil).
Another housingless oil cooler is disclosed in DE 1 97 11 258 C2, which has a reinforcing plate and a base plate for mounting the cooler. In this case, the reinforcing plate is designed as a thickened heat-transfer plate, and the base plate and reinforcing plate are soldered to the oil cooler. The base plate also has a surrounding edge with protruding brackets for securely screwing the oil cooler onto the housing of an engine block, with the connecting pieces for oil and coolant being inserted directly in suitable borings in the housing. The oil cooler is sealed against the engine block housing using seals which sit first on the connecting pieces and are also placed in a groove in the engine block housing. Moreover, the application of a groove in the housing, including the creation of a flat sealing surface on the housing, can lead to some undesirable expenditures.
The present invention is directed toward improving upon the above heat exchangers, including overcoming one or more of the problems set forth above.